Just Driving Around In An Oven

"How's it goin' Padre?"

"A bit chilly, what?"

Meaning it's 105* in the shade and Devil take the hindmost. Undaunted by an I'm in a preheating oven kind of feeling, I climbed into the rig and drove to the Pick 'n Steal. Old habits die hard and there, predictably, was First Baptist shining in the sun.

I always wonder if being First translates to Best. Do the First Families of the town go to the  first baptist church in the town? Perhaps they do, though once they would've been Episcopalien. Well, we messed that up.

Whatever, unfold the frame and scoot across the melting asphalt to the Shamrock and the best filling station coffee in town. I tell you, the shop's AC's a welcome relief. How did Texans get by without air conditioning?

Well, they mostly didn't because no one wanted to move here before it happened. Note, Dallas and the associated metrosprawl have only ballooned out of proportion subsequently. Which brings us to shooting.

A few years ago I'd think nothing of getting out in the heat and blasting away for a day in the August sun. 105*? Whatever, pass the ACP and all the rest. Now? Not so much. 

Mind you, I don't have much choice coz the leg's busted. How's that going to work out for September 1 and dove? Set up on a tailgate with a couple of Mojos out front and a 20? 

This, as with so much in life, remains to be seen. In the meanwhile, try not to melt.

God bless,

LSP

RAIN

You know what it's like. Walk out the door and you're in an oven, a preheating oven and there's no respite. Open the door to your rig and a blast of oven-hot air comes out and pounds you in the face. Relentless.

All in all it's like a furnace, so hot it seems the very air itself might ignite. That's probably why there's been a burn ban; wouldn't want any stray sparks catching the air on fire, would we.

And that's Texas in July, hot as Hell's Narthex, which was all too apparent in the parking lot of this asset-stripped rural haven's Walmart. 

There we were, the heat, the rig, the melting asphalt, Madonna singing Rain, it was hard to even move and then there it was. A cloud, a rain cloud.

It pulled in from the East and gathered momentum, thunderheads, and sure enough the heavens started to growl and rumble. Then lightning arced down like Satan falling from power and it began to rain.

Some of you, maybe all, will understand this. But whatever, take it as read that this Climate Change is a sure and certain gift from God.

Chill out,

LSP